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<title>Hellscape's Imagination by WarriorOmen</title>
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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/27990054">Hellscape's Imagination</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/WarriorOmen/pseuds/WarriorOmen'>WarriorOmen</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>The Old Guard (Movie 2020)</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Angst, Happy Ending, M/M, Nightmares, Prompt Fic, Religious Imagery, Religious Symbolism, Short, Short One Shot, unsettling descriptions, word count under 500</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-12-10</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-12-10</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-10 18:07:11</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Mature</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>No Archive Warnings Apply</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>454</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/27990054</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/WarriorOmen/pseuds/WarriorOmen</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>“No! No! Wake up! Please!”</p><p>---</p><p>Nicky may not be screaming aloud, but he’s screaming.</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Joe | Yusuf Al-Kaysani/Nicky | Nicolò di Genova</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>11</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>87</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>Hellscape's Imagination</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    
<p></p><div class="">
  <p>Nicky may not be screaming aloud, but he’s screaming.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>It shouldn’t be this difficult, not after all this time. But it’s been so long. So <em>unfathomably </em>long. He can’t stand it. He can’t handle it. He cannot tolerate the way Yusuf’s body does <em>nothing.</em></p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>There’s no movement, no breath, there is nothing. Not a twitch beneath his closed eyelids or a hitch that Nicky’s come to expect with painstaking reanimation.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>Nothing. There’s nothing. All that moves is the soaking hot air that scalds his face, brings redness to his cheek. Hot ash starts to climb up his neck, but crests, hardens and freezes confusingly. The sensation is a terrifying confusion, and when Nicky opens his mouth to scream he feels it melt into fabrications of glass into his lap.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p><strong><em>“Nicolò, Nicolò,”</em></strong> A voice chants and taunts in broken off would-be-Latin, teasing him from above, unseen and unintelligible, even as he finally FINALLY gets his arms around Joe’s body and clings, bringing him towards his rapidly expanding chest. </p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>Not this, not this, <em>anything in the world but this!</em></p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>
    <em>
      <strong>“ Nicolò , Nicolò!!”</strong>
    </em>
  </p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>He shrieks, and it’s fragments of glass reformed to lava.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>“Nicolò!! Nico, Nicky wake up, babe, wake up!”</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>“Yusuf..Joe..Joe!” Nicky tries to sit up, but Joe’s hands across his chest and arms keep him still. Probably for the best, he’d be dazed otherwise. His cheeks are soaked when the pad of Joe’s thumb finds the skin, grazing over light stubble. His chest is heaving, shirt soaked with sweat.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>“Nicky. Nico..oh Nico.” Joe’s own voice is shaky, his fingers tremble when they find Nicky’s own and lace together, hands joining over Nicky’s rapidly beating, thudding heart. Nicky’s entire body bowing with the effort of crying, heaving and gasping.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>He’s barely coherent, babbling and crying, Joe’s presence, his heat, his continued murmurs the only thing that slowly brings him down, brings him out, and it’s Joe’s chest he sobs into, Joe’s waist he clings at, Joe’s scent and security he takes to reassure him.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>They find themselves half-sitting and there’s strong hands in his hair, sweet mutters to his ear, there’s metal from his rings at the back of his neck and lips so soft to his temple, letting him calm, letting him know.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>He wouldn’t have to describe it. Not now anyway. Joe would have an idea. He doesn’t have to ask, doesn’t have to explain when he can finally pull back to lose himself in those concerned dark brown depths, wide as saucers and wet from his own tears.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>The skin is mapped out with Nicky’s fingers, the taste is consumed with his kisses, the scent inhaled and the security drawn in knowledge and assurance of <em>now </em>and <em>here.</em></p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>
    <em>They’re okay.</em>
  </p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>
    <em>Untouched.</em>
  </p>
</div>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>Extremely short Tumblr prompt fic. </p><p>Normally, this would get posted to Immortal Collections; but I found this one just a touch too heavy for it, and thought it stood on it's own fairly well. I also wanted to be able to tag the intensity appropriately, and thus gave it it's own post.</p><p>Self beta'd as always, and as usual, I'm on <a href="https://coffeebeannate.tumblr.com/">Tumblr</a>. Come say hello.</p><p>Thanks for reading!</p></blockquote></div></div>
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